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Review: Resistance 3

Unfinished Business

From the bizarre last chapter, unanswered franchise questions, large patches and broken online multiplayer it’s obvious that Resistance 3 was rushed and not ready for a September launch. It might have been the case of Sony pressuring Insomniac to release the game before the holiday onslaught of AAA titles that Resistance 3 couldn’t compete against. Whatever the excuse is, the game needed to be delayed a few months, or even into 2012, to smooth out these problems.

This is the third game in the series. Insomniac has developed the Resistance franchise for more than six years. The multiplayer should be getting better, not worse. With each new installment there’s been a decline in the multiplayer quality. The first game in the series from 2006 shouldn’t have a better multiplayer experience than the third game released in 2011. All Resistance 3 needed to do was build upon Fall of Man’s multiplayer, not overhaul the entire system. James Stevenson, senior community manager of Insomniac Games, said in August during the game’s beta testing:

Many of you have expressed concern that the game is not ready for launch in early September. I want to assure you that everyone here at Insomniac and Sony are doing everything possible to ensure that the launch day experience is great.

This clearly wasn’t the case. Obviously the game was shipped to retailers unfinished. I can’t recall any other title that had such huge patches the week of launch. It’s disrespectful to the consumer to shift the company’s irresponsibility onto the player. Not everyone has the fastest internet to download these huge updates. For some players it may take hours to finish them. People have a limited time to play games. They don’t want to spend their only available gaming time waiting for a patch to finish. Even after four patches, the multiplayer in Resistance 3 is still broken.

Insomniac had an extra year of development time and less features to focus on for Resistance 3. What did that extra year do for the game’s quality? Resistance 3 has less features than the last game and a smaller scale campaign, yet key features of the product don’t work. Sure, the campaign is awesome, but that’s only part of the package. It seems like Insomniac completely forgot about its previous two Resistance games and avoided giving long-time fans answers by tying up the loose ends of the series. Resistance 3 needed heavy polishing before its release. Early adopters are just guinea pigs and extended beta testers as Insomniac makes weak attempts to patch the multiplayer. What’s disappointing is that Insomniac is better than this. The developer has consistently put out high-quality games throughout the years, beginning on the original PlayStation in the ’90s. Resistance 3’s release tarnishes the reputation and goodwill from its dedicated fans the studio has earned over the years.

Even if the problems are fixed, at its core Resistance 3’s multiplayer isn’t anything special. The multiplayer isn’t the caliber of a system’s flagship franchise. The online feels like a generic experience you would find tacked onto a single-player game or a multiplayer made by a B-rate studio. There’s no Resistance spirit from the previous two games. The multiplayer needed to be overhauled. There’s too many problems with the weapons, abilities, leveling system and matchmaking. Most of the problems are obvious oversights that you’ll notice within the first 10 minutes online. Didn’t anyone at Insomniac actually play the game before releasing it?

I can’t see the online having any sort of longevity. The online modes aren’t strong enough to withstand blockbuster games like Gears of War 3, Battlefield 3, Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception and Modern Warfare 3, which are all out this fall and holiday season. There’s no reason to rush out and spend $60 on Resistance 3 when it includes sections that are fundamentally broken. The fact that Sony has the nerve to force used buyers to download a $9.99 Online Pass to play such a sloppy multiplayer is extremely insulting.

Final Thoughts

Resistance 3 features one of the top campaigns of this generation. The experience is absolutely incredible and is matched by few other games. A poor ending doesn’t do the franchise justice, but the campaign is still very emotionally powerful and engaging. An embarrassingly disappointing and broken online multiplayer stops Resistance 3 from being the best game released this year. Although Resistance 3 does many things well, Insomniac needed to polish obvious areas of the sci-fi shooter for the franchise’s swan song on the PS3.

Score: 3.5/5

Positives:

One of the best campaigns this gen

Mood & atmosphere

Weapon variety & upgrade system

Pacing

Capelli’s story

Online co-op campaign

Earning ribbons & medals in multiplayer

Negatives:

Very disappointing multiplayer

Lots of problems with multiplayer

Large mandatory patches & install

Campaign ending

No answers to franchise questions

Narrative transitions

Requires Online Pass

Resistance 3 was purchased new for $59.99. The campaign was completed on Normal difficulty in 8 hours, 07 minutes and 38 seconds. The online multiplayer was played for 10 hours to level 25. As of publication 27/59 Trophies were earned for 43 percent.

The game supports PlayStation Move, Sharpshooter controls and 3D televisions, but those features couldn’t be tested for this review.

One Response to “Review: Resistance 3”

Resistance could have been game of the year, if it wasnt for the Multiplayer. Although, in my opinion, the ending was WAY better than Bioshock, it was anti-climatic and that is what sort of killed the whole campaign almost.